The present disclosure generally relates to supports, sleeves, or “skins” for securely holding electronic mobile devices.
Small electronic mobile devices, e.g., mobile communication devices such as pagers, cellular phones, global positioning system (GPS) navigation devices and other satellite navigation devices, smart phones, wireless organizers, wireless personal digital assistants (PDA), and the like are typically easy to simultaneously hold and manipulate due to the size of these devices compared to the size of a user's hands. Moreover, the relatively small sizes permit users to comfortably simultaneously hold and manipulate these devices in several different manners.
For example, one manner includes using the pads of the fingers on both of a user's hands to support the rear surface of the device. The thumbs on both hands are then free to manipulate the device (e.g., actuate keys, a track ball, a track pad, a touch-sensitive display, or the like). As another example, another manner of simultaneously holding and manipulating a small electronic mobile device includes gripping a device between the palm and the fingers on the same hand. The thumb on the same hand and all the fingers on the opposite hand are then free to manipulate the device.
Unfortunately, the above manners of holding and manipulating electronic mobile devices typically become more difficult when using large electronic mobile devices, such as tablet computers, notebook computers, electronic readers, and the like, each of which may have a display size of 10″ or greater and a thickness of 0.5″ or greater. For example, placing the pads of the fingers on the rear surface of the device and using the thumbs to manipulate the device may be impractical because the thumbs may not be able to reach all areas of the front of the device.
Furthermore, gripping a large electronic mobile device between the palm and the fingers using one hand may also be impractical. However, this manner of holding a large electronic mobile device may be modified to be slightly more effective. For example, a user may attempt to “pinch” an edge of the device between the thumb and the fingers of one hand, although such a grip can quickly fatigue the user's hand. Alternatively, a user can rest the device on the palm and fingers of one hand and manipulate the device with the other hand. However, the device can easily be dropped because the user is not truly gripping the device.